This continues the transcript of the Weekend Work meeting of 15 November 1986 with Mr Adie.
Janelle: I had quite an interesting morning. I was particularly helped by the two ideas. The one is playing a role without identification. And one last thing you said about this work is serene. Christine called me to explain the recipe. I approached her, and I realised that my posture was one of the attentive little girl listening. In that moment, I realised that that wasn’t really appropriate. And something else seemed to come in, just like a flash, a flash of freedom. And then, while I was cooking and stirring the vegetables, I realised that there was nothing serene about this. It was just a total identification, really. I think at one stage it seemed quite laughable, but also quite serious, that I am always identified with me.
Mr Adie: Yes, of course, my identification is with me, me, me. Some oh-so important idiotic thing. So, as you say, your first observation was right, I don’t have to go on like this. You saw that your body just reacted in accordance with the body’s idea of what’s necessary, and that depends on how it’s been trained. Why should the body have this idea? You see what a mockery it is. The body can walk beautifully, if given the chance. See how it walks under the influence of its old ideas, with its old association. This is an aspect of formatory association.
Fanny: Mr Adie, things that you were saying this morning about identification helped a great deal today. Before that, I had a very vague idea about what identification was. And somehow some understanding came this morning and I was able to see not only that I was identified, but with what. And it was also related to my states every now and again.
Mr Adie: So, you have three or four different possibilities now in the one place. Whereas you had one sort of formatory misconception, you have now some kind of beginning. That’s good. Yes, I begin to understand the demands of the thing.
Boris: I become trapped with my thoughts. There were two different situations this morning when you spoke, you utter a statement, I accept it, and then my own thought begins to follow that. And then I lose it for a moment, and then I try to come back again.
Mr Adie: I haven’t understood. You are referring to your listening to my effort to try and explain the work?
Boris: Yes.
Mr Adie: And the effect? You say you listen for a little while and then you go away. Some process goes on and my attention is going to that.
Boris: Yes. And what I thought about that was that it is again, sort of my own very high opinion of myself that I consider my thoughts very important. And therefore, that prevents me from sustained attention.
Mr Adie: Yes. And I have a tremendous habit of referring it to the old coffee grinder thing, the associative thought we just mentioned. This takes us right back to the original meeting where we had such a pleasant meeting about an engineering specification. You remember our first meeting?
Boris: Yes.
Mr Adie: As far as I was concerned, it was a pleasant meeting with an engineer, very logical, good and clean and nice. The thing is, I am identified with this very competent, clear-headed engineer or whatever happens to be there. That’s what I’m identified with. That’s what’s working me.
Boris: The other thing is, I notice it also is associated with tension in the head.
Mr Adie: Yes. There are all sorts of manifestations. If you observe them, they can begin to help you.
Boris: Yes. For a moment I’m free of that, and I don’t want it anymore, but as the exchange took place, my attention varied. It was sort of a movement that was entirely different.
Mr Adie: Yes, that’s right. That’s true. There are all sorts of things going on, which, if our state changed just a little bit, we would see. You’re freer at the moment, you’re not tied. You’re full, but you’re not tied. And you have a sense of danger.
Boris: Could you give me some advice?
Mr Adie: You ask for advice because you have a sense of danger.
Boris: Yes, I see, right, well, yes.
Mr Adie: I have to bring my best understanding to the moment. You can’t do more. That means to see my belly is down, to see my posture is right. To see I’m not waving my arms too violently. To see I haven’t got this customary thing. I can only do that and have the wish. What more?
I wish to respond and I seek in myself for something that could respond from here. New concepts, if I can only relax, I can receive new concepts. That’s what I tried to bring this morning, a new concept, a concept of doing, for being. What identification really is. “I” am not identified, I don’t exist I am not there. Myself, what I am is already here in a certain state, including every measure of identification with some aspect of my automatic life. That’s what’s there. But my being state can fluctuate enormously, and it does include a representative of “I,” because everything is representative in a way, but it’s misrepresentative. In nearly everything about me, I’m misrepresentative. Now I seek for something that can be representative. Therefore, it must have something of consciousness, something of understanding, something of balance about it.
If I can have an experience of that, I can feel some renewed confidence. If I can see what I am not, it rather helps me to represent what I wish to be. Everything has a very positive alternative. I certainly see very much that I am not. If I can see that I am not that, then it gives me a chance.
I think, really, we’ve said enough now. And now try and work with this, it’s like having a new book. This is good, now you have that. Try and use that set of associated ideas that we have. Idea, her idea, his idea, my idea, the ideas we brought together. Try and have them close at hand this afternoon.
